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Saturday, 4 September 2010

Yemen army kills southern militant: official

ADEN, Yemen — At least one militant was killed and two others wounded on Saturday in clashes with the army in restive southern Yemen, local officials and medics said.

The fighting occurred at dawn when security forces put up a checkpoint outside Habilayn, in Lahij province, the sources said.

Three of the militants were shot, and one of them later died in hospital, the medical source said.

But an official of the Southern Movement said two of its members, hit by shrapnel, died in hospital.

The source said the army had started the fight, firing on a position held by the militants on a mountain overlooking Habilayn.

On Friday, three soldiers were wounded when their patrol was ambushed by presumed members of the Southern Movement, a local official said.

The army set up the checkpoint after an army brigade commander, General Thabet Nasser al-Juhuri, survived two assassination attempts last week, the official said.

In Huta, the provincial capital, militants attacked the local intelligence service headquarters with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades during the night causing damage but no casualties, witnesses and a security official said.

In neighbouring Abyan province, gunmen killed one policeman and wounded another in an attack on a patrol on Friday evening, the defence ministry's 26sep.net news website said.

South Yemen, where many residents complain of discrimination by the Sanaa government in the allocation of resources, was independent from 1967 until 1990 when it united with the north. It launched an abortive secession bid in 1994.

The Southern Movement is a mix of secessionists and those who seek greater autonomy for the region.